Almost March!

So Paul and I agreed to meet at the waterworks which held very little, a couple of singing chiffys, singing chaffinch and greenfinch and dunnocks and songthrush, lots of things singing now which is nice... A few teal and six shoveler and a pair of gadwall doing some sort of display... which was nice.

We then headed to a fairly new (for me) element to the patch! The leyton tip.. bottom of orient way near the roundabout. Looking at gulls, yummy! Nothing of note and no real standout birds but a few discussion able candidates and a probable 2nd winter/ 3cy argentatus Herring gull. We kind of got kicked off but i intend to spend some more time there before real spring arrives.

We then headed up the marshes, paul spotted something on the nearest pylon which turned out to be what we think was a young male peregrine. Images below show it to be a light bird, brownish with pale fringes tertials greater coverts extensive white around the nape which could mean there something else in it too  (lanner etc), commmets welcome, We watched it for a while and witnessed it half arsedly diving at a pair of collared doves and later it was joined by a large mature female who had caught a pigeon and they dined on its carcass atop of said pylon. Romance.

Five lapwings, picked up by paul were ignored by the peregrine and allowed to "migrate" south(ish) over the patch. Things are moving!

We got to the silos/filterbeds area and heard a few bullfinch calls, we then spent about 30 mins trying to track the buggers down to no avail and got covered in mud and scratched to high hell, but explored new parts of the patch usually only frequented by campers and people apparently caught short!

I picked up a buzzard very high headed W/SW over the mound/bench area (the only good bit of birding i did all day) and we both managed to get it in our scopes and watched it soaring briefly, I think we can expect many more this coming couple of months and red kites at least too so keep your eyes on the skies.

I don't think we saw anything else... but heres a few of photos from the patch i took on sunday as it was getting dark.

JP
@jarpartridge